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Starting to get a bit irritated by the reaction to my daughter's unusual name

I took my little girl Juniper to the doctors today and when the nurse called her name, i saw a couple of the other mum's (it was a children's clinic this morning) clearly say her name to each other then looked at me and my beautiful little baby with the most horrible sneering, mean girl looks. Honestly, i'm not being over sensitive here, it was ridiculous, i was really shocked. Most of the time we get lovely, positive feedback to her name and of course we don't all love the same names, we all know that here, i'm just so astonished by some people's reaction to the unusual. Sometimes people do seem a bit taken aback by her name and even comment politely that they hadn't heard it before and some clearly don't love it, which is fine, i have no problem with that at all; my name was unusual growing up, it was always a conversation i had and it never bothered me. But there have been a handful of times when people have gone too far; one woman (who wasnt very nice anyway for other reasons) even said Juniper's name was 'bonkers' and laughed! She had two kids, both with top 100 names and i never in a million years would have recoiled and said 'how boring! ' or something like that! Surely what i've called my child couldn't have rocked their world so much that they were scandalized enough to justify their rudeness! And its not like i called her something outrageous, or at least i don't think so. I know some people will say well, that what you get for calling your child something different, you have to consider their feelings and remember its a real person etc- yep, we realise that, its our precious child who we love, we gave her a name we loved , one that we thought long and hard about, and didn't choose it because we thought it would be funny to give her a zany name. Sorry, i'm veering into rant territory now aren't i? I'll stop now.

So, anyway, how should i deal with this? Has anyone else dealt with this? And does anyone know any other Juniper's in the UK? I should point out that Juniper isn'tin the top 1000 over here and i havent come across any others and i'd love to!

I'm very sorry this happened to you. Some people don't know how to handle different and react in a mean way. Some people are also just mean. You love your daughter and her name and that is what matters.

I'm sorry you've had this reaction :-( I'm in the US and haven't heard the name on a child IRL. Juniper is one of m favorite names and I'm sure there are plenty of people around these parts (I'm in Texas) that would react similarly.

Just remember - it's THEM with the problem and the lack of manners. Not you. I've heard plenty of baby names that don't sit well with me but - like you - I just nod and smile politely.

Your daughters name is beautiful! Plus, one of the great things about Juniper is that it can be shortened to June if she wants to go by something more "common" when she's older :-)

No need to let other people's bad behavior get us down. I would ignore any obnoxious looks but if someone comments, I would speak up. If someone called the name I chose "bonkers" - I would look totally surprised and say "Really? We found the name to be so inredibly beautiful and wanted our daughter to know just how beuatiful we think she is every time she hears her name."

I like simple yet versatile names that work well for the athlete, the comic, the genius, and the judge.

Argh, people! Freya55, I obviously love the name Juniper, if you can't tell by my username. Juniper was one of my mom's nn's for me and I loved it, it made me good I do agree with paw, if someone outrightly says something rude, do take a moment and say something nice about her name with a smile. I'm sure people's obvious rudeness will settle down when she is a little older and people (hopefully) will take into consideration a little girl's feelings (I think people think it's okay since she is a baby). Not that that's an excuse.